An imperfect solution for education
October 31, 2006| By Nathaniel Ward
“I talk about No Child Left Behind like Ivory soap: It’s 99.9 percent pure,” Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings said recently.
Unfortunately, writes Heritage visiting fellow Eugene Hickok, NCLB is not “the formula for what ails American education.” In truth, “it would be a mistake to think that No Child Left Behind delivers the education system we need.”
The fault doesn’t necessarily lie with the law itself, he explains. “American public education—because of the way it is structured, administered, funded and understood by parents, teachers, administrators and taxpayers—is incapable of delivering on the promises of NCLB.”
A more fundamental change is needed, Hickok says. But if these changes are to be successful, he says we must “toss aside certain assumptions.”
- “First, we must not confuse education with schooling. Education takes place long before a child enters school and lasts a lifetime. Schooling is about institutions and infrastructure. We need to focus on education in America, not just schooling.”
- “Second, we need to put aside the tiresome debate over public versus private education. What matters is the quality of the education a child receives, not where he or she receives it.”
Unfortunately, we have quite a long way to go. As Hickok points out, our public schools have become just another bureaucracy, measuring education in terms of dollars spent per student instead of each student’s achievement. Schools today serve “bureaucracies rather than the public. It’s as though the system owns us rather than we owning the system.”
“A new vision of education in America should embrace the principles on which America is supposed to be based,” Hickok continues, “freedom, equality, opportunity, responsibility and ownership.”
Nathaniel Ward is the Editor of MyHeritage.org—a website for members and supporters of The Heritage Foundation.
